Technicos Threadin' The Needle (Hand Sewing)

Co-Pubished with my Sewing Blog 

Me Encanta Coser/Enchanted By Sewing

http://MeEncantaCoser.blogspot.com

Bet you already knew that Thread the Needle is an old children's game, and also a dance step patterned after the game. I always get a kick from learning more about common events in daily life, by reading about old recreational pastimes. 

Though, in historical times, working with a sewing needle was probably about as typical an activity as other domestic tasks, I've never heard of a game called Wash the Dishes (though let me know if you've heard of one!). I'm guessing that's because dish washing is a more straightforward process. Hand needle threading has always been just ever so slightly challenging. And of course you often come up against it when you least want to deal with that finicky little task. These days we can typically change into another shirt if we rip a seam heading out the door, but only a generation or two ago, that might not have been an option. It was your day clothes or your Sabbath garment. So you quickly threaded a needle and ran up the seam. And it was just as important as it is today,  to get that thread into that needle eye quick-like-a-bunny.

As I've already mentioned in my post about threading a sewing machine needle, a little spit goes a long way. Yes, I lick the end of the thread (and I do wash my hands before I sit down to do this), but I also spread a little, well I just have to say it again - spit - over the eyehole of the needle. Just as in the case of the machine needle, the water molecules want to buddy up, and the thread is more likely to be attracted to the eye of the needle.

My other favorite needle-to-thread technicos include... beeswax. You can buy beeswax in the notions department, but I keep the stumps from the beeswax candles I buy from the farmer's market and use those. (I like to support those businesses because, and I know you know this too,  local honey promotes good diverse hive health, which is one of those save-the-planet kinda things. Agricultural mono-culture is a big concern for the future of my favorite fruits and vegetables.) Beeswax stabilizes the thread and makes it easier to push through the needle - less fibers on the end of the thread to push against that tiny needle eye.

Also I always make sure to cut the end of my thread at an angle. That makes a point that slips through more easily. I learned this from the same Viking Sewing Machine dealer who taught me the spit trick!

These are the tips that keep me in stitches. 

About.com has needle threading tips, including - but not limited to - those I use
http://sewing.about.com/od/beginner1/tp/needlethreading.htm

Definition
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/thread-needle

Dance Description and cool wood cut illustration from Webfeet
http://www.webfeet.org/eceilidh/dances/thread-the-needle.html

Technicos Threadin' The Needle (Hand Sewing)

Bet you already knew that Thread the Needle is an old children's game, and also a dance step patterned after the game. I always get a kick from learning more about common events in daily life, by reading about old recreational pastimes. 

Though, in historical times, working with a sewing needle was probably about as typical an activity as other domestic tasks, I've never heard of a game called Wash the Dishes (though let me know if you've heard of one!). I'm guessing that's because dish washing is a more straightforward process. Hand needle threading has always been just ever so slightly challenging. And of course you often come up against it when you least want to deal with that finicky little task. These days we can typically change into another shirt if we rip a seam heading out the door, but only a generation or two ago, that might not have been an option. It was your day clothes or your Sabbath garment. So you quickly threaded a needle and ran up the seam. And it was just as important as it is today,  to get that thread into that needle eye quick-like-a-bunny.

As I've already mentioned in my post about threading a sewing machine needle, a little spit goes a long way. Yes, I lick the end of the thread (and I do wash my hands before I sit down to do this), but I also spread a little, well I just have to say it again - spit - over the eyehole of the needle. Just as in the case of the machine needle, the water molecules want to buddy up, and the thread is more likely to be attracted to the eye of the needle.

My other favorite needle-to-thread technicos include... beeswax. You can buy beeswax in the notions department, but I keep the stumps from the beeswax candles I buy from the farmer's market and use those. (I like to support those businesses because, and I know you know this too,  local honey promotes good diverse hive health, which is one of those save-the-planet kinda things. Agricultural mono-culture is a big concern for the future of my favorite fruits and vegetables.) Beeswax stabilizes the thread and makes it easier to push through the needle - less fibers on the end of the thread to push against that tiny needle eye.

Also I always make sure to cut the end of my thread at an angle. That makes a point that slips through more easily. I learned this from the same Viking Sewing Machine dealer who taught me the spit trick!

These are the tips that keep me in stitches. 

About.com has needle threading tips, including - but not limited to - those I use
http://sewing.about.com/od/beginner1/tp/needlethreading.htm

Definition
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/thread-needle

Dance Description and cool wood cut illustration from Webfeet
http://www.webfeet.org/eceilidh/dances/thread-the-needle.html

Technicos: Sharpening Flannel Buttonholes (Green Sewing)

Green Sewing with Leftover Stabalizer Scrap
The irregular hole on the left hand side remains from the fabric's
previous life supporting machine embroidery.
Plenty of area remains to help out my buttonholes.

(Originally published in my Sewing Blog Me Encanta Coser/Enchanted By Sewing) When I made my first test buttonholes on my birdie vest, the first thing I learned was that two layers of flannel, even though they were interfaced on the inside, did that gummy thing under the needle. I bet you know how that gummy thing works, the fabric just doesn't move through right. Two layers of flannel will do that to you. They just want to stick together.

I've used different kinds of stabalizer in various ways when it comes to buttonholes. Having recently been working on sewing area cleanup, it occurred to me this time to try out some of the scrap pieces I've saved from machine embroidery. There's such a lot of stabalizer leftover around the design. (Yes, I can't help but keep it. Occasionally I use it to write project directions on for myself.)

In this case I was able to pencil my buttonhole measurements and guidelines onto the sheet and sew through onto the buttonhole. Not only did the fabric slide really well, My buttonholes came out nice and straight!

Toy Shelf: Environmentally Conscientious Elves

What could be s a better look for the holiday tree?
Fuyu persimmons are both edible and biodegradable

When it comes to holiday decorations out here in California, we're always fans of the natural look.  During the festive season, the local elven brother and sisterhood follow environmentally sustainable decoration harvesting practices.


(co-published with A California Christmas Cottage)

Fairy Houses

Click on the image above
For a close-up view of the lands where the Fairy Folk Dwell

Fairy housing beats ours hands down. The fay folk are the green construction originals when it comes to environmentally 

conscientious

 developments.

• Pefectly permeable pavement - no challenge to the aquifer!
• Edible totally organic roofs and walls reduce the cost of transporting food to the home
• High-efficiency, non-fueled solar lighting
• Totally compostable buildings lead to no-waste, no environmental impact

Scraps:Covering Buttons (Letter to Sharmila)

Dear Sharmila,

In sewing class the other day you asked me about the covered button I'd made for my vest using scrap fabric from the project. Here's the lowdown.

* The covered button forms are available in normal places, like Joannes. There is a version with a tool or a no-tool one. I just get the no-tool type and snap them in place with my fingers. Maybe the other kind is good for heavier fabrics? I'm not sure.

There are different sizes of button forms
They come in round head
or flat head style
I have also used the flat head style for
creating beaded buttons, using
scrap fabric as a base to attach the
beading
Make sure the beads don't go to far out if you
do that, but far enough to cover the scrap fabric
You really need to make a test covered button with
the same sized forms to figure that out!

* I use a piece of scrap paper (like a recycled mailer card) to match the pattern on the back of the package. It's just a half circle, but of course I cut out the entire circle. Some covered button packages have multiple circles depending on the size you bought.

* Then I center the pattern over a great design in my fabric. I have also cut up an old stained embroidered linen napkin, making use of the embroidery and cutting away the stain. (I need to find the jacket I put that on and photograph it!)

* I glue stick the circle on top of the rounded button form. When you and I were talking about this, Ronda suggested that you could interface with a lightweight fabric, like silk organza, if you were using a light or sheer fabric, like the beautiful sari fabric you were sewing with when I first met you.

* Then I turn the form over and catch the edges of the circle on the teeth on the back of the button form. I have to do lots of smoothing of the edges to avoid puckering.

* Once I'm happy with the placement of the fabric and it's caught well on all the teeth I snap the button back in place. I always get confused by which side goes inside, but one part has grooves that fit better. I have to push hard, but eventually it snaps in place with a satisfactory click. They don't come apart after that.

* Sometimes I make them up with scrap fabric, not knowing how I will use them and just put them in my button collection.

Hope you enjoy making some. I'd love to see what you come up with!

Your sewing buddy,

Laurel

I forgot I had these with me yesterday.
I made three different types and tried them all out on my vest.
I might use one like a pin on the vest, just for decoration.
They are also nice on a purse or bag.

Scraps of Wisdom

Birds Nest ?
Or does an environmentally conscientious sewist live here?
These scraps from my pieced vest project
Are just too pretty to toss
And what a waste of resources, eh?
Heather's idea would be great for these

I save strips of pretty fabrics that get cut off along the edges of my sewing. I use them for

- Stabilizing the edge of an inseam pockets
- Hair ties
- Ribbons for presents and other packages
- The string that goes through the hole in a vintage-styled luggage tags I create in Photoshop.

A frayed edge is great for an arty look in any of these reuses. The stabalizing strip doesn't care if it's frayed.

Scrap Strips
Awaiting Repurposing

I keep a cup hook screwed into a bookcase near my sewing machine and toss them over that as I'm working on projects.

Heather of The Sewing Loft had a posting about turning even smaller fabric scraps into yardage, that I plan to try. I love using up every bit of fabric, which clearly don't do much good in the landfill. I get to a point where I have tiny, tiny scraps and this looks perfect. 

Digital Quilting:Global Warming, The Norwegian Block

The first block in my Digital Global Warming Quilt.


This is a surprisingly challenging quilt to design.


Who ARE these Americans who are denying Global Warming? Here's one article that gave me some ideas. "Why Americans Deny are in Denial".

Sewing: Annhhh Just Bag It! Bribing Us to Be Green (Green Movement Humor)

 

Them Bags, Them Bags

Sung to the traditional tune, ‘Dem Bones’

Head bone connected to the shoulder bone

Shoulder bone connected to the arm bone

Arm bone connected to the wrist bone

Wrist bone connected to the hand bone

Hand bone connected to the finger bone

Finger bone holding them bags!

Them bags, them bags, gonna walk around

Them bags, them bags, gonna walk around

Them bags, them bags, gonna walk around

Oh HEAR the word of the Green!

The Green Studies Handbook

for Down-To-Earth Romantics

Did you miss the last Green Movement Humor Piece in this Journal?

Annnh, Just Bag It!

Bribing Us to Use Our Green Shoppin’ Bags

All us environmentally conscientious types know the problem. We acquire giveway bags or maybe we buy or sew some really great ones. Then we forget to take them to the store and end up staring blankly at the clerk when asked, ‘Pastic or paper?’.

Here’s what worked for me.

Bribery.

Remember a long time ago when you said you would never bribe a child to do something? That’s right. Children should be motivated by the pleasure of the activity and the righteous feeling that comes with well – doing!

If you nodded your head vigorously, then I bet you haven’t had or cared for a child in a long time, have you? Next time a young child comes over, be prepared with a few of those I-Voted stickers you got handed the last time you went to the polls.

~

Once I too forgot my bags. All those charming tote bags that I sewed from remnants, recycled bits and even brand new fabric. I was really into sewing bags for awhile. And all of them stayed tucked away at home when I walked, biked or, very occasionally, drove out for groceries.

My neighborhood Trader Joes started a little bribery campaign that did it for me. Every time we remember our own bags and don’t take one of their bags, we get to fill out a little drawing slip, and pop it in the bucket by the managers desk. It’s on the honor system. If I think I saved two bags, that’s how many tickets I put in. Once a week somebody at the store pulls the tickets (they just have our names and phone numbers – no nobody collects it for their database) and calls the lucky winner.

I know it’s going to happen for me any day now! I’ve been doing this for about three years, and I walk to Trader Joes at least five days a week to pick up maybe some yogurt, a box of cereal or a loaf of bread. This also satisfies any gambling yearnings I may have ever had. It’s pretty clear to me that I can save my money when it comes to going to Las Vegas or Reno.  Even though I’m sure I will win every time I put the slip in the bucket, it hasn’t happened for me yet.

The prize is a $25 gift certificate at the store. Trader Joes makes a good chunk of change off shoppers. They can afford twenty-five bucks. Not only that, they may be making money off their greenness. One of the cashiers told me that the very first week they put this system into place they saved an entire palette of bags. In terms I can relate to, he told me, that’s 25% of the bags they used to buy. Trader Joes uses only paper bags for carryout – no plastic- and I think he said those cost them a nickel a piece.

Maybe you can talk a few vendors in your area into doing something to reward people for bringing their own bags. A small store wouldn’t have to give away a great big credit as Trader Joes does. Maybe they could give out the free prize of the week – something they got a lot of or they got a good deal on. Maybe they could have the drawing once a month instead of once a week. Maybe they can figure out a way to save themselves a few bucks by giving out less bags and make it fun.

It worked for me.

Post Script

Whole Foods is a longer walk for me, and I don’t get there as often. They have a system whereby you can donate the nickel or two cents, or whatever the cost of the bag you didn’t use, to one of several charities. This is tied into the automation in the cash register system, but I don’t know why a regular small store couldn’t have one of those little donation jars for earthquake relief or something similar out, with a big sign encouraging you to donate the savings from your bagless use to the jar. The store could have a special campaign (a poster) up on the wall and say something about encouraging ourselves to be green and, at the same time, help out somebody. Oh, you marketing types, you get the idea.

Romancing the Rose (Green Movement Humor)

please click on the illustration above, for more rosy detail

The gentle rose bud

What could be more natural?

Soft soul of the earth

The Green Studies Handbook

for Down-To-Earth Romantics

Romancing the Rose

Coming back with a bike basketful of roses from the farmer’s market, I was reminded of the nineteenth century urban romantics fascination with the natural scene. I was admiring some of the great landscape art that came out of that era just yesterday in the Cantor Art Museum over at Stanford University.

Improved agricultural methods combined with the industrial revolution in places like England, and later in the Americas, sent people to live in towns and cities from the mid 1800’s on into the later part of the century. Food could be produced in greater abundance by less and less hands. Rural lifestyles for the common woman, like my great-great grandmother, Anna Sherman, and her sisters became a thing of the past as they moved off the farm and into downtown Chicago.

Fortunately for Anna, she was able to qualify as a telegrapher. Not for her the daily struggle at loom or in a factory. As they joined the new breed of white-collared workers, her descendants could romanticize the rural life Mama and Grandmama had left behind. The landscape painters and photographers whose works I was studying yesterday, captured the dreams of these new Romantics.

Forgotten was the manure pile, the backbreaking hours of pitching, lifting and straining, and the despair of drought, insect plagues and other natural elements that led to crop failure. We recalled  a fantasy world of  wide-open vistas, rolling hills and an earth of perpetual flowers, sunshine and fishing anytime we wanted it. We imagined walking out into our own gardens to harvest a head of still-growing lettuce or freeing a carrot to crunch fresh from it’s earthy compost-rich home.

Like the properly modern day Romantic I am, I carry on this fantasy tradition. On Sundays, I trot over to the farmers market on foot, or wheel over by cruiser bike. Often, of course, I  imagine that I am tripping gaily down the path on market day, with my basket dangling from one hand and my long skirts bunched up in the other. There I will buy farm fresh lettuce, rainbow hued chard and deep crimson or pale pastel colored roses cut just this morning and trucked in behind the farmer’s slow moving horse. Of course that horse is always named Old Dobbin. I think that was required.  I will feel just like I plucked these farm fresh products myself. 

And as an added benefit, I can feel smugly environmentally conscious arriving at the downtown market under my own power to buy locally grown products.

Today I stopped to talk to the farmer who sold me my roses at the downtown Farmer’s Market. The vendors are often happy to chat, especially when it’s a little rainy out and there are few shoppers taking their time. My roses came from his neighbors greenhouses in Watsonville. They are grown there in greenhouses throughout the winter months. Though these flowers came over the grade in the back of this gentleman’s truck, along with his spring greens and bok choy, the majority of the roses his fellow farmer grows are sent by big freight trucks or air plane to other parts of the country.

When the flowers arrive, still fresh in New York or Santa Fe, they must still look as though they’ve just stepped off the farm. We discussed the elaborate, expensive and resource consuming containers that are required for those shipping methods and wondered about the costs of fuel in contrast with the fuel this farmer’s Old Dobbin truck consumed on his way over from the coast. Once the flowers arrive at their destination, the florists arrive to eye these emigrants who have flown 3,000 miles away from California, or perhaps 2500 miles from Colombia.

So fresh, so natural. It’s almost as though we stepped outside our own back door and plucked the tender buds from the vine with our own dainty little fingers.